Overview

• On Oct. 9, analyst Charles Edwards urged Bitcoin developers and major stakeholders to implement quantum-resilient protections by 2026.
• Edwards said some large holders portray the threat as "10+ years out," which he claims helps fuel short-term price pumps.
• Google Quantum AI researcher Craig Gidney recently estimated a 2048-bit RSA key could be factored in under a week with fewer than one million noisy qubits.
• Gidney’s update marks about a 20-fold reduction from his 2019 estimate that envisioned roughly 20 million qubits and eight hours of computation.
• The calls for action focus on the risk that Shor’s algorithm could compromise Bitcoin’s ECDSA-based signatures once sufficiently powerful hardware exists.